Music as a More Influential Form of Media

After lecture on Tuesday and then watching “Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes”, I really began to think about if and how the media affects me. Media is a huge part of my life because I am constantly surrounded by television, music, movies, and the internet. Even though I am immersed in media practically all day every day, I would still say that the media does not affect me. In lecture we talked about how most people would say the media doesn’t influence them, but yet they do believe it influences other people. In reality, the media does influence everyone in one way or another. I agree with the Hypodermic Model, in that the media injects views and ideologies into the defenseless public unknowingly. However, I believe that some forms of media are more effective at changing people’s beliefs and views.
In the video “Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes” a point is made in defense of hip-hop that the music videos are forms of entertainment just like movies are forms of entertainment. However, I believe that the music industry has a bigger influence on people’s views and beliefs than the movie industry does. While both industries are in the entertainment business, there is a huge difference between the two that makes the music industry a more effective and sometimes more harmful form of media. When people watch movies or television, they know that what they are watching is not real and that the characters are not real people, rather just actors. I will admit that I have watched shows and movies where I have wished I were more like one of the characters, but then I always realize that they are just that, a character. On the other hand, when someone watches a music video, and they see their favorite artist dressing and behaving a certain way they believe that what they see is who those people are. Even though the musician may just be playing a part the same way an actor in a movie does, the difference is that the audience does not always know that it is just an act. It seemed to me from the video, that most of the hip-hop artists didn’t see anything wrong with their lyrics and videos because they say that its just part of an image. I think that the artists are being just as ignorant as the audience to believe that their behavior is only part of an image and that it doesn’t influence anyone. The two major issues brought up in the video that have been a major influence on our culture are violence and exploitation of women. As anyone can see violence and the exploitation of women are all over the media, not only in the music industry. However, like I have been saying these images in the music industry can be more harmful to our culture because people do not always separate what they see from reality. So when people see famous musicians rapping about shooting people or half naked women grinding all over the rappers, they think that in order to be cool or successful they have to act the same way. I think that hip-hop music videos are a good example of how images can be polysemic because even though white people may listen to more hip-hop black people are most influenced by the violence and exploitation of women portrayed in the videos which is evident in the higher rates of violence and sexual assaults. So there is obviously a difference between the way most white people perceive the images they see in the music videos and the way most black people perceive the images. I think that before any of these issues in our culture can improve, it is important for the artists to recognize that their behavior does influence the people who listen to their music and watch their videos.